Nicolae Miu, the man who fatally stabbed a teenager in July 2022 on the Apple River in Wisconsin, has been sentenced to 20 years in prison.
Miu, 54, was found guilty on April 11 of the first-degree reckless homicide of Isaac Schuman, 17.
The convicted killer was also found guilty of lesser charges of stabbing and injuring four teens – three boys and a girl.
Miu – who was sentenced a day after the two-year anniversary of the tragic incident – bowed his head and teared up in the courtroom.
‘He stole Isaac’s life, and he stole my life,’ said Isaac’s mother, Alina Hernandez. ‘Justice to me is getting my child back…I’m thankful the jury got it right and the monster will die in prison. He has no soul…he’s evil.’
Nicolae Miu, 54, who fatally stabbed a 17-year-old teen on the Apple River in July 2022 was sentenced to 20 years in prison on Wednesday
Isaac Schuman, 17, died after Miu stabbed him in his chest in the river on July 30, 2022. Miu was sentenced a day after the two-year anniversary of his death
‘He has no remorse. He plays the victim. It makes me nauseous. Judge, I ask you to sentence him to the fullest,’ she added.
Prior to his sentencing, Miu turned to Isaac’s parents and said: ‘My soul is broken; my heart is very heavy. I never meant for this tragedy to occur.
‘I pray to God for forgiveness, compassion and love for everyone affected directly and indirectly by the outcome of this tragic event,’ he added.
Miu’s rampage came after he was surrounded by a large group of raucous teens while tubing down the river and several of them pushed him around while accusing him of ‘looking at a girl.’
Video of the interaction showed the teenagers heckling Miu before he pulled out a Swiss Army knife and started jabbing them.
When Isaac was attacked by Miu, Owen Peloquin, his friend, said he didn’t see him get stabbed but rushed over to the teen and brought him to shore with his other friend Alex after they realized.
‘I tried my hardest to stop the bleeding,’ Peloquin said as he became visibly emotional on the stand during his testimony.
Miu of Prior Lake, Minnesota, claimed that his lethal stabbing was ‘self-defense’ after the group of tubers claimed that he was ‘looking for little girls’ and ‘taking pictures of girls’ in the area
Isaac was taken in an ambulance to the Lakeview Hospital in Stillwater where he was pronounced dead.
Ryhley Mattinson, A.J Martin, Dante Carlson and Tony Carlson were the other four teenagers stabbed that day.
Mattinson had to have emergency surgery and when she arrived her blood alcohol level was at 0.09.
Carlson suffered penetrating trauma from his stab wounds and had to have a hernia repaired. His blood alcohol level was also 0.09.
Peloquin said that Miu ‘just weirdly like sprinted at us, just made us all super uncomfortable.’
The Romanian-American engineer had claimed he acted in self-defense.
On the day of his conviction, jurors were sent out of the courtroom to deliberate Miu’s fate as prosecutors and defense attorneys battled over whether it was self-defense.
‘Nicolae Miu is a murderer who did not act in self defense,’ DA Karl Anderson told jurors in his closing arguments – and said video of Isaac’s July 2022 killing proved his point.
‘One of the things the defense said at the beginning of trial and in their opening was they’re glad there’s a video,’ he said. ‘So are we.’
Anderson also rubbished claims Miu was scared when he stabbed Shuman – and said his behavior was the result of a bad temper.
Prior to his sentencing, Miu turned to Isaac’s parents and said: ‘My soul is broken; my heart is very heavy. I never meant for this tragedy to occur’
‘Nicolae was not in fear, he snapped.’ Anderson said.
Anderson added that Miu could have brandished the knife as a threat and scared Shuman and his friends off without resorting to horrific violence.
Corey Chirafisi, Miu’s lawyer, insisted his client had been rounded on and threatened by a fearless mob and that the stabbings were justified.
He said: ‘They got in his face, they screamed at him, they called him names, they swore at him.
‘They put their hands on him and the group of six, they became brave.
‘The group of six became brave to the point that they circled him and start taunting him.
‘They do this to a man who has done nothing, absolutely nothing to them.
‘Then, when that man, Mr. Miu, tries to create some space between him and Madison Coen, they pounce.
‘They punch him. They push him. They slap him. They hit him again.
‘They choke him. From, all directions. And Nic Miu acts in self-defense.’
Chirafisi highlighted how unafraid the boys seemed during the attack, their lies about him being a pedophile and that one was heard saying to Miu ‘You got 10 seconds.’
‘In your everyday experiences in life, when someone tells you that you have 10 seconds, what normally comes after that?’ Chirafisi continued. ‘Nothing good is coming after that. It’s reasonable in our experiences as adults to take that as a threat.’
As he was shown pictures and videos from that day during his trial, Miu said he was touched by Madison Coen and Mattison before the knife was drawn.
‘They were very close, they were really close to me. I could feel and hear them,’ Miu said.
Miu described how he reached for his pocket knife as his fear got ‘really high’ just before Madison placed her hand on his upper arm.
In recorded interviews, Miu said: ‘All of a sudden, they were like wolves around me and they were attacking me from all directions and I truly, truly, feared for my life.
‘They came on to me. They hit me, they got on top of me, and I don’t remember anything after that.’
The three-inch Swiss army knife that was used by Miu to stab the youngsters in 2022
Miu on the stand, tearing up and smiling when he talked about his pet dog during his trial that lasted eight days, as more than three dozen witnesses took the stand
During his testimony, he said that he didn’t know how many people were attacking him but he knew that there were ‘more than he could handle’ and that he has had ‘nightmares’ since.
A witness, Larrion Davis, later told investigators that he saw the attacker ‘taking pictures of girls’ in the area.
However, as he took the stand, Davis appeared confused over this claim, and admitted he wasn’t sure what he saw because ‘there was a lot going on.’
Miu’s then-wife Sondra told detectives that the violent altercation began after Miu, whose group was further up the river, went back to find a ‘phone that was lost’ while wearing snorkeling gear.
While he was looking, Sondra said a ‘group of guys got off their tubes and started hitting’ him.
The trial lasted eight days, as more than three dozen witnesses took the stand.
Miu pleaded not guilty to the charges in September 2022.
He was originally born in Romania and immigrated to the US when he was a teenager.
Sondra and Miu got divorced after the incident and he was ‘living a peaceful, quiet life in Minnesota’ and ‘had never been in trouble before.’
